Async in Node.js Addons with NAN

Async in node js is implemented as threadpool jobs. The way node js works is that V8 is executed in the main thread, when V8 needs to call a c++ function it can either execute it in the main thread or it can schedule it in the threadpool.

Node js uses libuv asynchronous I/O library. by default it uses 4 threads in the threadpool, but it can be changed with the UV_THREADPOOL_SIZE environment variable. (ref)

The way NAN async works is, first you define a c++ class (which inherits from AsyncWorker or that accepts a callback and c++ primitive data types as parameters. then you define the Execute function which does the actual work and lastly you define the HandleOKCallback function which will do the actual callback.

The first step is to create a Nan::Callback instance from the v8::Function parameter, which is a standard Javascript error-first callback, which later can be converted to Promises.

// Asynchronous access to the `Estimate()` function
NAN_METHOD(CalculateAsync) {
  int points = To<int>(info[0]).FromJust();
  Callback *callback = new Callback(info[1].As<Function>());

  AsyncQueueWorker(new PiWorker(callback, points));
}

If you need to keep data between the call and the callback you can use SaveToPersistent and GetFromPersistent, this data is not available inside the async execution but its only used between the Callback instantiation and the javascript callback after execution.

From v8 Embedder's Guide:

Persistent handles provide a reference to a heap-allocated JavaScript Object, just like a local handle. There are two flavors, which differ in the lifetime management of the reference they handle. Use a persistent handle when you need to keep a reference to an object for more than one function call, or when handle lifetimes do not correspond to C++ scopes. Google Chrome, for example, uses persistent handles to refer to Document Object Model (DOM) nodes. A persistent handle can be made weak, using PersistentBase::SetWeak, to trigger a callback from the garbage collector when the only references to an object are from weak persistent handles.

If you need to use data for the execution you must use native c/c++ types and you must do it while creating the class instance, either in the constructor or before calling AsyncQueueWorker (more on this later).

In our example, PiWorker needs the number of points to calculate an estimation of PI, since we don't have access to any of the V8 values that we got in the function arguments (e.g. info[0]), we'll need to convert the value to C type and then use it in the Async Worker Execute.

Now we have created an instance of PiWorker, which inherits from AsyncWorker, we passed the number of points AND the callback which was passed to our CalculateAsync function:

addon.calculateAsync(100, function(err,result){
  if (err){
    console.log("error executing pi calculations", err);
    return;
  }

  console.log("result", result);
});

We can schedule the PiWorker on the threadpool, 

// Asynchronous access to the `Estimate()` function
NAN_METHOD(CalculateAsync) {
  int points = To<int>(info[0]).FromJust();
  Callback *callback = new Callback(info[1].As<Function>());

  AsyncQueueWorker(new PiWorker(callback, points));
}

actually, when calling AsyncQueueWorker it schedules the Execute for execution and WorkComplete  to execute (on the main thread) when the execution is done.

inline void AsyncExecute (uv_work_t* req) {
  AsyncWorker *worker = static_cast<AsyncWorker*>(req->data);
  worker->Execute();
}

inline void AsyncExecuteComplete (uv_work_t* req) {
  AsyncWorker* worker = static_cast<AsyncWorker*>(req->data);
  worker->WorkComplete();
  worker->Destroy();
}

inline void AsyncQueueWorker (AsyncWorker* worker) {
  uv_queue_work(
      uv_default_loop()
    , &worker->request
    , AsyncExecute
    , reinterpret_cast<uv_after_work_cb>(AsyncExecuteComplete)
  );
}

The Execute method will be executed in one of the threads of the threadpool and when its done, it will execute either the HandleOKCallback or the HandleErrorCallback depending if the SetErrorMessage was called or not.

virtual void WorkComplete() {
  HandleScope scope;

  if (errmsg_ == NULL)
    HandleOKCallback();
  else
    HandleErrorCallback();
  delete callback;
  callback = NULL;
}

So writing Async Callbacks is pretty simple once you understand the program flow.

Source Code:
https://github.com/nodejs/nan/tree/master/examples/async_pi_estimate

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Tags: async, NAN, node js

Dror Gluska November 30, 2016  No comment